Anyway, luckily not all boards were as annoying as this one and I got some testers. Unfortunately it seems that every version of the exe has the starting XP at a different offset. This means that I will have to write a new version that searches for the default value then remembers the offset at which it was found and uses that thereafter.....

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we do know what were talking about. had you mentioned you were modding BG we would probably have been more supportive, even if such a thing is just slightly off-topic on this board. as your post read though we assumed that you were just wanting to play the game with more XP, which would be foolish since there are many cheats to do this.

I could have told you about the different offsets. since start XP is likley a Constant in the program it'll be at the end of the exe, and therefore will move with any program changes. annoying, but there you go. even if its local and not a gloabal constant, any changes before that point will still move it.

might it not be easier to use a quest script to modify you characters to level 1 though. it is possible to modify all the other variables this way. the jaheria curse quest messes with her stats, Lum the Mad can drain 15 levels, although i think its temporary. and there are any number of sections which add a special ability or take one away.

the point is then your mod would work with any version of BG2, and would work with any future versions as well (not that there are likley to be any, but it is possible), without the risk of some rare version not much used not having the right offset.

if you insist on exe modification though you might find it easier to insist upon the latest version being installed before you start. that way theres less chance of someone installing a later official patch (which might or might not replace your modified exe, depends on how you work it) and there will be less bugs, which means less emails to you about known issues.

anyway, this post is getting far to long, so i'll just ask you to post details about your conversion when you finish it (hey, i want to play all the good mods) and then finish it.

*sigh* I wish it was as simple as scripting or applying spell effects. The only effect that comes close to actually getting rid of proficiencies, HP and abilities is level drain. The default is 89000 XP and I wanna start lower without level draining.

Messing with stats is not the same. Spell effects can change almost any stat but that is not what I want. After all, how can I know what to reduce the stats to? It would not be random HP if I did that. I could make a huge script that looks at class, applies spell effects to remove abilities and stats based on class and removes XP as well.
But it is easier just to set the starting XP.

All versions do have a different offset for XP. You could have told me that could you? Hmmmm.....
I will still try and make my universal patcher.....the value 89000 only turns up once in the whole file and so can be found and the offset stored in a log file.

Anyway, thanks for the encouragement....of course I'll let everyone know when it's done.....it'll be a while yet... (we are after all scrapping the whole storyline and making a new one)

__________________Too set in his ways to ever relate
If he could set that aside, there'd be heaven to pay
But weathered and aged, time swept him to grave
Love conquers all? Damn, I'd say that area's gray